It was only a couple of years ago that Aviva launched their Myprotector plan, an enhancement of their term plan with competitive premium rates.

Since then, other companies have followed suit and made their term plans more competitive by revising their premiums downwards.

The “race to the bottom” (in terms of premiums) looks set to continue as Aviva has just launched a new term plans called Myprotector Plus.

Under this new plan, Aviva has reduced the premium amounts. Furthermore, it comes with a series of other features:

• insured able to increase his/her sum assured without evidence of health at several life stages; where there is a change in marital status, upon becoming a parent or at graduation.
• choose TPD cover up to age 70 and CI cover up to age 99
• purchase a higher per life cover; up to S$2m per life for CI benefit and up to S$4m per life for TPD benefit
• a 5-year auto renewal term option, which covers up to age 80 (Customers may choose to cancel the policy if they do not wish to renew)
• choice of male or female specific illness cover to complement the CI Accelerated Benefit for more comprehensive illness cover

I just did a simple comparison for a male, non-smoker, born in 1980. For a 30-year term of $200k sum assured covering death, total and permanent disability and critical illness, the premiums cost $918 under the new plan while previously it costs $952. That’s about a 4% decrease.

Just a couple of things to take note of though. The MyProtector Plus is only applicable to the level term plans and not the decreasing term plans.

There is also a minimum annual premium of about $350 for the death mortality charges. Which means that if the sum assured for the death is too low, it will not be accepted by the plan. This is the case even if your overall premium is high after adding in the critical illness benefit. In the past, this would have been possible.

Overall, this trend of lower premiums for term products can only be good for consumers.